𝐶𝘩𝑎𝑒𝑙𝑎

but then he has the one up from that. for when he’s kinda mean to you, but not overly mean ya know? where he’s telling you how good you did for him and he’s holding you really close and his hands are scratching your back or your thighs real gentle and he’s rubbing your arms or your ankles (or your back if he had you bent funny bc he can’t fathom being the reason your back hurts)

and then he has the post hard core, mean dom aftercare. where he pulls out so fucking slow and he tells you every little thing he’s doing and the praise doesn’t stop (even if you’re so fucked out you can’t respond)

“did so good.”

“that’s my best girl, love you so much.”

“made me so proud.”

“thank you for trusting me baby.” kinda shit.

and then he’s carrying you to the bathroom and setting you on the counter before he’s running a bath. he’s not letting you stand yet.

The Hughes’ lake house wasn’t unfamiliar to her, she’d been to their childhood home since her younger brother, Trevor, dragged her along when she was seventeen and now at twenty-four, by autopilot, she still attended Quinn and Jack’s lake house, slightly buzzed from the alcohol and watching the boys play another game of pool. She leaned against the wall, nursing an almost empty glass of vodka lemonade and watching Jack lean over the table, taking his shot and hooting when the ball dipped into the hole. It wasn’t much of a party, more like a group of friends hanging out but with the way the music rang through her ears and boys cheered and threw beer down their throats, she almost felt like she was seventeen again. Almost. The difference between being seventeen and twenty-four in the lake house was that at twenty-four, her heart bred nothing but resentment that most people would have moved on from, yet no matter how hard she tried, she could never shake that sinking feeling. 

Jack handed the cue to Trevor, backing away with a cocky smirk on his face and ignoring the glares Trevor gave him. He knew he was stepping into the prohibited territory, he had been for years, but the adrenaline that rattled through his bones was an addiction. The addiction that ruined everything. 

Y/n exhaled, bringing her lips to her glass, watching him saunter over and lean his shoulder against the wall next to her, his figure feeling like a shadow over her. She felt it coming, already two weeks into the summer, and neither had brought it up yet, every year they almost got to the conversation. 

“Hey, Minty-” he said, his voice with his confident twang, so close to her ear she may as well have been listening to it through ASMR. She could have been blasted off vodka and yet she’d still remember his voice, plaguing her. Even on nights when everything was on her mind, Jack’s voice somehow still crawled back to her, his words replaying on a never-ending cycle she wished would stop.

“-you’re still fucking calling me that? How many years has it been? Five? Six? Thought you’d be over it by now.” Her words may have been laced with venom with the way she spat them out. There was no need to put the polite mask on when it was just the two of them, the others were too focused on their game even to notice them, Trevor was part of that group too despite the warning look he gave his friend. 

Jack slipped his hands into his pockets, eyes scanning her face and he remembered how the light always sparkled in them, even when she was pissed off. He missed hearing her voice. On his worst days, he’d spent many lonesome nights watching old videos and smiling at her giggles, arguments with Trevor caught in the background of other videos - anything to remember how it made him smile.

“Word on the street is, you moved to New Jersey. You miss me that much? If you ever need a personal tour, you have my number. Mi casa es su casa, baby.” His lips pulled upwards into a smirk, eyes shamelessly scanning her face - how he felt her glare daggers into him, how her lips met her glass and how she licked them after.

She finally looked up at him, not an ounce of excitement on her face. Her lips were straight, and her arms were folded over her chest. She said, sarcastically, “Oh, I wonder who told you that? I’m surprised you even know what that fucking means.”

Y/n pushed off the wall, swirling her almost empty glass and bumping past him, swaying her hips as she walked from the games room through to the kitchen. He watched, like a hawk, the smirk endless and he shook his head. He didn’t know what took over with her, but he found himself strolling behind her, removing his Yankees hat to push his hair back and place the hat back on, turning the corner into the kitchen and leaning his hip against the counter next to her. 

She poured her drink precisely, his presence strong in her orbit. She’d be lying if she said it was suffocating, it was more familiar. Some things that occur in the past just don’t disappear as people think. You can move on, forgive, forget, but they’ll never cease to exist. The exact situation they stood in was the last time they were truly happy, giggling with aching cheeks and stomachs. Now it just felt like taunting.

For a split second his stomach flipped with excitement, gaze still stuck on her face, “Admit it, you’re a little impressed. Come on, Mint, aren’t you just a little excited?” 

Not one moment of peace with him. She released an exasperated sigh, placing the lemonade bottle down harshly and turning to face him. Her voice bitter, “Oh, yeah, I’m excited to be here, with my friends, and very happy to see Luke, he’s adorable, but living in the same city as you? Couldn’t think of anything worse. S’not like I had a choice, work and all.” 

“You wound me, baby.” He dramatically held his hand over his heart, sticking his bottom lip out into a pout. His lips then pulled into a grin, his stomach fizzing at the glare she set on him. “I’m serious though, we should hang out.”

Deciding to keep her glare on his eyes was nothing but a trap she’d fallen into before. His eyes were a sea of blue that had a fresh sparkle to them, pupils forever dilated whenever he was looking at her and something about knowing he still pined for her made all the little dormant fires in her alight again. Tingles ran down her spine every time his smile broke through the wall she’d built, chipping away at the artificial hatred she tried so hard to convince herself was real.  

She scoffed, rolling her eyes and harshly turning away. The door back to the other’s wasn’t far yet the longer she felt Jack’s demeanour devouring her, the further the room felt like it was elongating away from her, “Ugh, you wish.”

“Mmm yeah, I do.” He hummed, biting his bottom lip. Her tone hadn’t changed over the years, and he knew it was immature of him to hope everything would dissolve, the things he let go of were clearly the things that mattered the most to her.  A twisting guilt hit him in the chest abruptly. Brushing the mess under the rug only worked for so long until it started to overflow, and the older he got the more the dirt started poking out and seeping into his world. His grin dropped and he called out, seriously, this time. No jesting in the way he stood up straight and locked his eyes onto her with a fire, “You still mad? Y/n, it was six years ago, and I said I was sorry. I don’t know what else you want for me other than that. Come on, you’re being unreasonable.”

‘What an asshole,’ he thought, scolding himself, for that matter. He never was good at spitting the right words out when he cared so much. His breath hitched when she stopped, her knuckles turning white at the grip change of her fingertips. Y/n breathed in slowly and released, squeezing her eyes shut before blinking rapidly, drying her waterline as best she could. 

‘I will not cry over a man. I will not cry over a man. I will not let a man make me cry. I am twenty-four and I will not cry over Jack Hughes anymore.’

She swung around and raised her voice at him, not quite a yell but enough that Jack flinched back at the outburst, watching her lip tremble before gaining her composure again.

“Fucks sake! ‘Sorry’ won’t cover it. We’re not discussing this now and don’t you dare talk to Trevor about it either, it’s not his business and I’m not being the reason you two fall out again.” She raised her eyebrow at him, waiting for him to reply. He watched the way her body rose and fell with her heavy breathing, how her eyes glossed over, she held back the tears. If he had learned another thing when growing up and stepping into the wider world, it was that there was only so much someone could take before the bucket of chained-up emotions overflowed and poured out. 

He pathetically nodded, jaw clenching as she left the room and feeling a punch to his pride at how he couldn’t take charge of the situation. How he couldn’t do anything in that moment to make things right again. He took his hat off and placed it on the kitchen counter, turning towards it and hunching over and resting on his elbows. His palms ran over his face, feeling his hot breath bounce off his hands and back onto his skin. The last time he’d even so teared up was nothing but a faded memory blocked out and he didn’t want to cry but the waterworks slipped through his ducts. Tears may not have run down his cheeks, but his eyes burned with a torturous longing, a yearning for the one thing he ruined out of his own arrogance. 

Y/n rounded the corner, entering the games room again and re-taking her place leaning against the wall, brooding with her lips held to the brim of the glass. It was shocking how she and Jack had even been friends for so long, she should have hated Jack from the start, but she couldn’t. The first time she’d met him was her first trip to the Hughes’ lake house at seventeen when Trevor was forced to take her. The group of them (Quinn, Jack, Luke, Trevor and y/n) had been getting ice cream one evening - and whether it was an accident or not - Jack knocked hers out of her hand, the mint choc chip pressing into her t-shirt and dripping onto her toes and the concrete. She remembered the way the boys’ faces paled. The way Jack’s mouth fell open with incoherent words tumbling out, cheeks rosy red. How Quinn turned around and rushed off to buy her another while Trevor helped her clean up and Luke scolded Jack. 

Then before they had known it, they’d grown out of their innocent adolescence. Lake house trips turned to y/n and Jack sneaking off together down to the dock, the back-and-forth texting about half-truths, almosts and the divine of another’s attention. Cool nights huddled by the bonfire as she’d wipe melted marshmallow from his lips, how butterflies seemed to linger the older they got and closer their proximity became, faint touches pushing the boundaries of a blurry line, intertwining fingers to palms and eventually arms tangled and shoulders pressed into each other. 

She peered around the room, watching the boys begin another round of pool before shifting to Quinn, catching his eye and sighing. The eldest Hughes approached with purpose and urgency, something expected from an eight-year-long friendship, borderline second brother. But the difference between Quinn and Trevor was that Quinn had a sixth sense for people, while Trevor was submerged in the game of pool, Quinn was the one standing in front of her, arms folded over his chest with raised eyebrows and a face that said, ‘I know something’s wrong’. 

“I know you’re not gonna talk to Trevor. What did Jack do now?” He murmured. 

She pursed her lips, avoiding his gaze, “Nothing…he just… brought it up again. S’all. We argued. I walked away.”

“You two are so frustrating,” he signed, rightfully. He’d grown up watching the two connect and then fall apart, heard both sides of the story but let them figure it out. But he’d tried doing it the y/n and Jack way, now it was the Quinn way. “Y/n, we’ve been close for years and I love you like a sister, but have you ever considered how Jack feels? Maybe he does have something he wants to tell you after all.” 

With his eyebrows knitted and voice clipped, he walked away towards the kitchen. Of course, he would defend his brother. It was natural and suddenly she didn’t feel like drinking anymore. She placed the glass onto the sideboard, folding her arms and tipping her head back into the wall. Maybe Quinn was right, maybe she had been a little selfish by not at least hearing him out. It had been years since he’d thrown everything back at her, turned his back on the one person he claimed was his everything. Sneaking into bedrooms just to lie with each other, fingers tracing feathery touches along stomachs in spontaneous patterns, along jawlines and kisses so tender they could heal a broken heart just…meant nothing anymore. 

“Hey, idiot, I’m talking to you.” Trevor snapped his fingers in front of her face. She blinked, her vision concentrating on his flushed face. “Welcome to earth, ‘sup? You’re quiet.”

“I’m good, just buzzed.” The way his face didn’t budge when she spoke made her exhale, rolling her eyes at him. He never believed her; she wasn’t sure why she’d bothered because he knew about the situation back then and he’d been harbouring his irritation ever since. It wasn’t easy to cope with being stuck in the middle of it all, he and Jack had already fallen out once over it, but managed to make amends on the condition that they never bring it up again. But she broke her promise of not talking to her brother about it, sometimes all you need is family, “Fine, yes, it’s Jack again-”

There was only so much Trevor could take before he had to lose his cool about it. He’d tried to be supportive; he’d tried to be neutral, but in every social setting where everyone was together, his sister and Jack just could not be civil for one second, just could not leave each other alone and a strong part of him knew the truth. He knew that deep down, she still wanted him in her life, and he always knew how Jack felt, he never hid it after all. But he was tired of her. Tired of the moping and arguing, tired of the resentment as an excuse. “-Fucks sake, y/n. I told you to stay away from my friends back then because this is what happens. If you wanna talk to him, just stop being stubborn and do it. I love you and I hate seeing you like this, but it has to stop.” 

“Okay, well what do you suggest I do? Just go outside and let him spill his heart?” She furrowed her eyebrows. He was her brother; he was supposed to be on her side.

“Yes!” He exclaimed, watching her face soften. She nodded, not expecting him to be that serious but if Trevor was giving her advice, then it was really impacting him more than she thought. She never thought getting involved with his best friend would be that big of a deal, but she was too caught up in herself to notice her own sibling being torn into two worlds.

He didn’t take his eyes off hers, burning holes through her and she swore under her breath, fumbling with the porch door handle before slipping out into the night. The floorboards creaked as she turned right, towards the corner and sat on the porch swing. Perhaps a breather would’ve helped, perhaps everyone was right, and she needed to finally give Jack a chance instead of throwing him out on the streets. Guilt riddled her, that insecure, whirling feeling in her stomach as she gently swung, staring out into the darkness, the pathway to the docks illuminated by little lanterns. 

Quinn practically shoved Jack out the kitchen door, repeating words of encouragement to move his yearning heart no matter how much Jack protested and tried to get back inside. The door locked in his face, and he pulled a face at Quinn through the glass before groaning. Her swinging caught the corner of his eye, even from the other end of the porch in the inky night, he still thought she was beautiful, glowing like a star, as corny as it sounded to him. 

“This seat taken?” He said quietly, rocking on his heels in front of her. 

“You’re so corny,” she refrained from smiling yet her lip ever so slightly curled up, “just sit.”

And so, he did, carefully taking the seat next to her, trying not to send them both flying. He leaned back into the cushions, letting her set the rocking pace as silence fell between them, just the crickets singing to them as minds raced for the words to fall into place. Deja vu lingered around the place, sitting on their shoulders as if asking them to go back in time and try again, that kind of sombre heartworm still connecting them one way or another. 

Jack’s chest tightened, his heartbeat pulsing in his ears more than it ever had before, not even hockey made him that afraid. He fiddled with his wristbands, raking through his brain for the right words to form a coherent and meaningful sentence as the strain between them only thickened. Y/n’s eyes watched him in her peripheral vision, the way his tongue wet his lips, how he’d pushed his hair behind his ears (she always thought he looked pretty when he did that), how she knew he wasn’t going to speak unless spoken to, in fear his voice would shake. But instead of that winding rage she once harboured in her chest, her stomach sank and perhaps the hurt she’d locked away was finally catching up as her eyes watered. Yes, she had known him. She still knew him and well enough to know he was consuming himself.

“Different time, same place, eh?” she said, averting her gaze back out into the yard, watching the boats rock on the lake, “It was a pretty shitty thing for you to do to me, after everything we’d been through. The things we’d done. Just felt a bit…unimportant, Jack. Do you know how much I cried over you?”

He sniffed, not needing to look at her to know she was scowling. The bitter tone opened a Pandora’s box of memories. How he’d been drafted. How they’d celebrated one night and how he’d met with her for the last time on the dock in their pyjamas, riddled with nerves and excitement blurred together, his mind a mess and the words tumbling out carelessly. He remembered the smile on her face morphing. Not into a frown but a smile that was sad. That pained smile that fronted joy, but he knew he’d screwed up somewhere. He was leaving her behind with a promise that she’d always be his number one. And what a lie that had turned out to be.

“Yeah, I know. Believe it or not, I think about it all the time. How I should’ve knocked on your door that morning I left. I didn’t want you finding out that way, look, I was fucking stupid, I know. I was just some kid with an ego, and I should’ve…I should’ve fucking said goodbye.” He croaked, knowing the moment all too well. His younger self got in the car when his mother asked if he’d seen y/n. He lied, of course, too thrilled with getting to New Jersey as soon as possible. 

He hadn’t noticed the pain in her smile at the time, but the more he thought about it, the more he noticed it. It wasn’t the leaving for New Jersey part that got to her, it was the next words he blurted. To his memory, ‘Can I ask you something?’. And he knew damn well he lied about the answer too. The way her heart sank when he followed it up, his shattering watching her storm away with tears bawling. He didn’t want to really call it quits with her, like he’d said, he was just a coward. 

And that was the end of it. The end of them. Their almost. The beginning of his brief falling out with Trevor, the beginning of the strain. He’d left without a word. She found out from Trevor that Jack had left, who was under the assumption she’d already said her farewells. Y/n had been, so to say, abandoned by the boy she loved (and who she thought loved her back).

“Yeah, you should have. Even if you didn’t love me back, you should have said goodbye. You made me feel abandoned and Trevor was the one who felt guilty, Jack. All while you were out there chatting up every girl you thought was cute, probably told all of them they were your favourite too. I know that too well.” Her voice clipped that time, cutting him. 

“I didn’t.” He replied too quickly, defensively. “I didn’t want to make you feel like that. I’m sorry I left like that and I’m sorry I made you feel like that, if I could go back, I would. Actually, there’s a lot of things I would say and do differently, and for starters I would be more honest because I did love you back, you’re right. But I was like, what, seventeen, eighteen and thought I was hot shit. It’s not an excuse but it’s the truth, I was immature. That night on the dock shouldn’t have been our last conversation.” 

As much as she thought she should have been screaming in his face, calling him absurd names and despising him with every fibre of her being, she couldn’t. It wasn’t until he’d started talking about anything other than flirting that she realised how much she didn’t hate him after all. She’d been resenting him because deep down she just needed to hear those few words that he was wrong. Pretending to hate, she’d been doing that the whole time and it did nothing to make her feel better. Talking, properly, felt like she was sinking back into a peace with herself, a closure. Her face softened and she finally faced him, bringing her fingers under his chin and tilting his head to her. 

Her voice softened, her touch on his skin gentle and rapturous, “No, it shouldn’t have been, and you lied to my face. You said there was something you wanted to ask me. What was it, Jack? And tell the truth this time.” 

The last time they’d looked into each other’s eyes was when they secluded themselves to a limbo of their feelings; on, off, were they, weren’t they, fun, feelings - drowning in love yet couldn’t figure it out. She’d forgotten how refreshing it was to be in the company of, not just another, but him. Once long ago, Jack made every day a fresh breath of air with his smile and bright eyes, that morning summer breeze feeling, wind in her hair. Those moments returned even in their doom and gloom reunion. His fingers wrapped around her wrist, moving her hand from his chin to his cheek and melting into her palm. 

His mouth opened and faltered, the words on the tip of his tongue and his chest tight, but her eyes boring into him backed him into a tiny corner. Never in his life had Jack felt his confidence slip from under his feet and suddenly he was sixteen again, cheeks burning and a whirling in his stomach, “I…I was gonna ask if I could kiss you for real…not for fun or whatever.”

Her eyebrows pulled together. Not because she was upset, but because they’d equally been avoiding a mutual feeling out of pride. One getting too big for his shoes, the crown of first pick on his head and the other dwelling on the concept of hate, just to reject the subconscious knowledge that somewhere inside him, held feelings. 

“Why?” she asked, defeated and with confusion. His eyes glossed over, and his stomach dropped thinking the worst. His lips parted yet her hand remained on his cheek, the butterflies in her stomach threatening to tangle her fingers in his hair and pull him in, “Why wait until the end when you were about to leave?”

“Because I was scared, okay? I was leaving for the city, and you were going to college, and I thought you’d meet a better guy and forget about me. I should’ve just told you how I felt sooner instead of pestering you like I do because I can’t stop thinking about you.” His voice croaked; the first time she’d ever heard his voice croak like that. He was a human, he was allowed to feel, but she’d never in her life heard or seen Jack Hughes show his vulnerability. 

She shuffled closer, thighs touching with the breeze floating through their hair. Goosebumps ran over her body, his fingers timidly winding around her nape and igniting the fire in her stomach to warm her chest. She didn’t push him away, or grimace, the sensations soaked into her skin, and she bathed in his touch which she yearned for the whole time. Every photo of his arms around girls she didn’t know, the ones she’d scoffed at, becoming fragments of the past and slipping from her memory, the jealousy unwinding from her shoulders and her free hand found his other cheek.

She watched his other hand rest on her thigh, her throat dry and heartbeat heavy, she crooned, “No one would’ve been better than you. I can’t forget or even hate you if I tried.”

“So…you don’t hate me? Even after I…” he raised his eyebrows with the corners of his mouth turning up. If he had asked that hours ago, she would have fought every truth in herself and told him yes, but now that she had no more secrets to keep, no resentment left to cover her feelings, she was just as vulnerable as him, so why bother lying about it. She nodded, smiling gently. “Can…can I kiss you now?”

Years wasted with running and chasing, bottling feelings and dwelling on the past, regretting teenage mistakes when if she had just given him the time, they could have been happy a long time ago. But it didn’t matter anymore, they spoke their truth, accepted apologies and allowed themselves to love each other for real. She finally felt light, and he’d gotten rid of that overwhelming guilt he’d fought his whole adulthood up until then. It was crazy what honesty could do for people.

“Yeah…yeah you can kiss me.” She nodded again, desperately, “I loved you then and I love you the same now. I’m just upset that you left without a goodbye.”

“It wouldn’t have been a goodbye, princess. You know that. We’d find a way.” He leaned in, mumbling into her lips before tenderly pressing them to hers. It wasn’t perfect, fumbling, hands trembling and breaths shaking but once they’d become accustomed to the way they felt, they melded. Closed mouth at first, but Jack hummed, his hand on her nape coaxing her closer into him, lips releasing for a breath just for her to pull him back in for another slow kiss, one that oozed more confidence and assurance in what they were doing. 

It was long-awaited, something they should have done before he’d left for Jersey. Their chests ignited and fuelled a greed to devour more of each other, to savour each other’s flavour. His eyebrows knit upon her teeth nibbling his bottom lip, yet he parted on instinct, tongues lapping, finding a languid rhythm with breathy moans just quiet enough to keep between themselves. She pulled back first, noses brushing and panting heavily, watching how his eyes wore that wild look, hooded and determined, the same look he donned during hockey. Nothing else mattered but her, his world tuned out while his heart locked into her every movement, tracking her every emotion that appeared on her face. If he was in control he’d have dived back in, gone for her neck and smothered her with wet bites until she was underneath him to completely show her how much he loved every part of her. But that was the devil on his shoulder, his desires. Instead, his stomach fluttered, the hand on her thigh sliding underneath and swinging them over his lap, bringing her into him as comfortably as possible. Neither spoke, just gazed out at the lake where the boats bobbed and the moonlight shimmered over the water, finally making peace with each other and themselves.

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